[Info-vax] Opportunity for VSI?

[Bill Gunshannon]

On 12/14/18 9:48 PM, Arne Vajhøj wrote:
> On 12/14/2018 9:11 PM, Bill Gunshannon wrote:
>> On 12/14/18 2:21 AM, Phillip Helbig (undress to reply) wrote:
>>> In article <g7g5e4F3t1mU1 at mid.individual.net>, Bill Gunshannon
>>> <bill.gunshannon at gmail.com> writes:
>>>> It did not help keep VMS
>>>> around Universities it was already at and certainly didn't
>>>> bring it into new locations.  Trust me, I know.  I fought
>>>> that battle until finally being told the equipment had to be
>>>> removed.
>>>
>>> Back in the days of DECcampus, DEC salesdroids were telling universities
>>> that unix was the future.
>>
>> VMS replaced IBM in the University data center.  Unix did not
>> replace VMS, Windows did.
> 
> University administrative IT went Windows like everybody else.
> 
> But first Unix and later Linux took over large part of
> CS and natural sciences for both research and teaching.
> 

And, why do you think that happened?  And if you think DEC/COMPAQ/HP
was visiting Department Chairs and convincing them, you are very
mistaken.  Academia drives the bus, they don't ride in the back.

And, again, it was applications that drove this to a large extent.
We had a Professor get an Alpha in the early days.  Quickly learned
there were not only no usable (for his research) applications on
VMS but also not on Windows.  Thus, he moved to Linux.  Even before
I came to the University when I was a contractor, we lost a bid to
DEC.  The University putting out the RFP was very adamant that they
wanted a VAX.  They got it.  And were very unhappy.  DEC delivered
a VAX with VMS.  All the software the professor running the RFP
wanted to run came from Kitt's Peak Observatory and it was all for
BSD Unix.  If DEC had done their homework they would have known that
and avoided a very unhappy customer who was very unlikely to ever
buy another VAX from DEC.  We had withdrawn our bid when it became
obvious this was a no-win situation. None of the owners of VMS
ever had to actively push Unix over VMS.  Al they had to do was
continue to shoot themselves in the foot at every opportunity.

bill